


Living and Loving Are a Benediction

by My_Alter_Ego



Category: White Collar
Genre: Angst, Betrayal, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Star-crossed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-27
Updated: 2016-08-27
Packaged: 2018-08-11 09:14:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7885249
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/My_Alter_Ego/pseuds/My_Alter_Ego
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>According to Orson Welles, “If you want a happy ending, that depends, of course, on where you stop your story.”<br/>In Neal and Peter’s case, it just may be where you pick it up again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Living and Loving Are a Benediction

     The sweat on Peter’s body was slick as he undulated atop Neal, who was facedown on the bed in his loft. Each of Peter’s deep thrusts elicited an earthy, sensual moan from the con man that spurred the FBI agent on and quickened his rhythm. Both men were breathing hard and caught up in the sexual frenzy until the exquisiteness of the carnal moment took Peter over the top. The muscles in his body tightened as sensitive nerve endings sent a cascade of pleasure through his body. He forgot to breathe as an explosive orgasm began that seemed to go on forever. After it was over, panting and spent, he collapsed upon his lover beneath him.

     As Peter’s respirations returned to normal, he slowly used his tongue to lap up the salty wetness that had accumulated on the back of Neal’s neck. Then he placed soft kisses on the sensitive spot below his lover’s ear as he ran nimble fingers through a thick mop of dark brown hair. Finally, Peter rolled off the young man and turned him over, gratified to see the wet patch of cum on the sheets beneath him. As always, they had certainly succeeded in pleasuring each other to a climax, a replay of what had occurred so many times in the past.

     Sated and happy, Peter then drew Neal across his chest and leisurely ran caressing strokes up the young man’s bare back. Neal sighed, his ear over Peter’s heart, and closed his eyes in blissful oblivion. This was perhaps the best part of lovemaking for Neal—the contented little isolated oasis after the endorphins had kicked in and made you happy and thankful that you were alive and capable of reaching the stars, if only for a little while.

     Peter was busy with his own post-coital thoughts. The unlikely partners had been lovers for almost a year. It had happened insidiously, but each man found it so very hard to fight against the inevitable. They were meant to be together, both on the job and in bed. Neal was halfway through his parole on the anklet, and Peter looked forward to the day when his lover would be a free man—free to love whomever he chose, to live wherever he wanted, and to be whomever he desired.

     It had taken a while for Peter to realize that he didn’t care about the consequences when he and Neal could be open about their relationship. If that revelation negatively impacted his career, then so be it. He rationalized that a job was a poor substitute for love and fulfillment with a soulmate. Yes, he had finally admitted to himself, he did love this enigmatic and mercurial young man who drove him to the heights of frustration as well as ecstasy. He could not imagine existing on this earth without him.

     Peter’s thoughts inevitably found their way to his lips. “Someday ….,” he began.

     But, Neal raised his head before his handler could say more. The young lover looked at the older man with a wistful smile as he placed two fingers across Peter’s lips.

     “Peter, please don’t think ahead right now. Just ‘be’ here with me. Every moment that we live is like a fragile soap bubble that, sadly, will become just a memory in the next instant. So let’s simply experience ‘being’ right now.”

     “I love you, Neal,” a persistent Peter insisted on saying.

     “I know that you do,” Neal said, almost sadly, as he sank down once more across Peter’s chest.

     The next day, Neal was gone.

~~~~~

     Sometime during the night, the tracking anklet had stopped transmitting, and Neal had disappeared. There had been no warning, nothing to explain the how or the why. There were no beacons to follow, no clues left behind in the loft. It was as if the con man’s molecules had disassembled and simply evaporated into thin air.

     At first, Peter refused to believe that Neal had run. He would never leave Peter like that, and there had to be another explanation. Quickly replaying all of their current and past FBI cases, the frenzied agent searched his memory for anyone in that mix who would want to abduct or harm Neal. He came up empty handed. Finally, when Mozzie could not be found, Peter had to face a hard truth. Neal had decided to leave of his own volition.

     So many strong emotions began warring within the FBI agent. Peter felt stupid, and hurt, and foolish, but most of all he felt angry—angry with Neal for obvious reasons, and with himself for being gullible and seeing what he wanted to see. He now knew that he had been just another mark to Neal, a conquest. Peter was someone to toy with until Neal got bored and deemed that the time was right for a deceitful pseudo-lover to cut and run.

     Peter headed the task force that, in tandem with the US Marshals Service, relentlessly scoured the globe for any trace of the escaped felon. Weeks went by, then months, until Neal’s trail was beyond cold. Peter had been hell on wheels in the office, and his junior associates walked on eggshells around their boss. They certainly could understand his wrath and frustration, and kept their heads down and their noses to the grindstone.

     Eventually, however, all the brouhaha subsided, and other cases took precedence and claimed Agent Burke’s attention. And finally, Peter’s anger also quieted just a bit to be replaced by melancholy and angst. Alone in his bed at night, he went over and over those last moments that he had shared with Neal—moments that had now become just memories. What had Peter missed? What hadn’t he done right? What should he have noticed? Then ultimately, there ensued a candid assessment of their mismatched relationship. Why would a handsome and vibrant man like Neal ever be satisfied with a staid, middle-aged, ordinary FBI agent? What could have ever been the attraction? Peter had to admit to himself that he been such a fool and had seen only what he wanted to see.

     On those nights when Peter wasn’t quite so angry with his one-time lover, Peter allowed his mind to re-live the rapture of their sexual encounters. Taking himself in hand, the lonely and sad man tried to elicit those moments, hearing once again the lust in their two voices made guttural with need and desire. He felt Neal’s muscles ripple beneath his touch, and the shivers of sexual pleasure move through his beautiful body in waves. It had seemed so very real at the time, and Peter wished that he could turn back the clock and just “be” with his lover once again.

~~~~~

    Seventeen months later, Peter got to do exactly that. Finding Neal had occurred by way of a very circuitous route. Interpol had been investigating a series of vicious murders that spanned across several European borders over the course of the last year. Unsuspecting foreign tourists had been the target of a depraved individual, who first waylaid them in dark alleys to rob them, and then protected his anonymity by silencing them with a switchblade. It was hoped that the latest victim possessed a clue to his executioner’s identity because an astute medical examiner in Belgium had managed to extract a miniscule sample of DNA from beneath one of his fingernails.

     While running the sample through a worldwide database, the determined investigators got a hit of sorts about another outstanding case which had nothing to do with the current murderous mayhem. Actually, the match was not found within a criminal catalogue, nor a military one. Perhaps through some convoluted snafu, it appeared in a medical database. The complicated molecular strands of that DNA seem to belong to “Patient X” in a Swiss hospital’s archives. Of course, that private institution, located in Lucerne, was less than cooperative with the authorities. Nonetheless, the dogged detectives had their surreptitious methods and somehow managed to unearth the real identity of a man living in a nearby chalet. That man turned out to be Neal Caffrey.

     Neal was being extradited back to the States, and would be landing at Kennedy airport within the hour. Peter insisted that the Marshals bring the wayward criminal to the 21st floor of the FBI building. This was unfinished business for Peter—something that he had to do no matter how painful. There were things that he just had to know.

     Neal was now sequestered in an interrogation room, and Peter took a deep breath before he entered that small space. He made a big production of shutting down the cameras and recording equipment before seating himself across the table from the con man. Peter’s team on the other side of the two-way glass decided that Peter deserved his privacy and a chance to put his demons to rest, so they quietly filed out.

     Peter studied Neal intently. The con man looked the same, but then, he also looked different. His hair was considerably shorter and the strands were sharply spiked. He was whippet thin, and that leanness made those chiseled cheekbones more pronounced. His eyes were still that mesmerizing blue, and the fond, soft curve of his lips was just the same as Peter remembered. Above all else, that sad smile is what threatened to break Peter’s heart into pieces.

     “Hello, Peter,” Neal murmured gently.

     Peter swallowed the lump in his dry throat. Finally, he took a deep breath and plunged in.

     “It’s just the two of us now, Neal. Nobody can hear us, so you can tell me everything. When did it all become clear to you? Was it before or after you left?”

     Neal stared down at the table between them that represented a no-man’s land separating them emotionally as well as physically. When he continued to remain silent, Peter, against his better judgment, found himself pleading and demanding. It took every ounce of fortitude to keep his voice even.

     “You owe me an explanation, Neal. If nothing else, I should finally hear the truth! When did you first know?”

     Neal sighed deeply before lifting his eyes once again to Peter’s.

     “About a month before I left you, I began noticing things. They were transient at first—annoying, but the kind of thing that you want to ignore and hope that it was a passing glitch in your metabolism or something. But then, after awhile, I couldn’t overlook them, because they kept happening more and more frequently. I had some horrendous headaches, then bouts of blurry vision, and unexpected balance problems. It all began to scare me, and I needed some answers.

     So, June’s doctor arranged for me to have some tests right here in New York under a pseudonym. Eventually, a neurologist gave me the cold, hard facts. My ‘little’ problem was a glioma in my brain, and the prognosis was less than rosy. Although gliomas are not a rare form of brain cancer, they are difficult to treat because they are aggressive tumors that tend to proliferate even after surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy. The life expectancy from diagnosis to death is usually about nine months from start to finish.”

     Peter knew that Neal had been sick because the medical database that held his DNA profile was that of the Swiss Comprehensive Cancer Center located near Neal’s hideout in Lucerne. Peter hadn’t been privy to all the details, but now that the unexpected knowledge had been delivered so concisely and dispassionately by Neal, himself, the FBI agent felt as if a speeding bullet had suddenly slammed into a Kevlar vest protecting his chest.

     “Why didn’t you tell me, Neal?” Peter whispered in anguish. “I would have been there for you, right there beside you through whatever treatment.”

     Almost as a reflex, that wistful little smile appeared again on Neal’s lips.

     “I know that you would have moved heaven and earth to try to help me, Peter. Nevertheless, the fact remained that my future was very bleak. The federally mandated medical health plan that covered felons like me was certainly not going to spend megabucks for any treatment just to prolong a criminal’s life. And, there was no way that I wanted you to have to endure the decline that was waiting around the corner. It would have been ugly and messy, and so not the way that I was determined to leave this world. So, I decided to spare you the heartache and me the embarrassment. I wanted your last image of me to be whole and intact, and not some shadow of someone that you once knew. I don’t think that I could have endured your pity.”

     Peter found himself getting angry. “So, you made a decision for me as well as for yourself—one that you had no right to make. Then you slunk off like a sick animal to hide away and die alone, or to outright kill yourself!”

     “I wasn’t alone, Peter. Mozzie went with me. And yes, I fully intended to end this on my own terms, and that didn’t include days and days in hospice care being filled with mind-numbing narcotics.”

     “You didn’t have that right, Neal!” Peter bellowed. “I loved you, and you should have told me!”

     Neal raised his eyebrows and stared at Peter. “I think that I had every right to make those decisions because it was my body that was failing me.”

     Peter got his emotions under control. “So, go on with your story, Neal. Tell me everything now.”

     “When I fled New York, the first flight out of the city took Moz and me to Milan, Italy. We stayed there for a day or two, but then I got it into my head that I wanted to see Lake Como, which isn’t very far away in the northern Lombardy region of the country. Kate loved the classics, and 'A Farewell to Arms' by Ernest Hemingway was a favorite of hers. She made me read it about a million years ago, and I kept remembering that the hero and his lover were fleeing Italian authorities, trying to make an escape to Switzerland by rowing across a lake. I wasn’t even sure that it was Lake Como. Anyway, Mozzie would have done anything that I wanted by then, so one dark night, Moz and I re-enacted that scene. We didn’t exactly row across Lake Como; we used a motorboat to cross it, which took us to Lugano, Switzerland.

     After that, I let Mozzie do his thing because I just didn’t care about what was going on around me, and he eventually found us accommodations in Lucerne. Looking back on it, I’m sure that there was a method to his madness. Moz was always doing intense and compulsive research, and he must have stumbled across this study being done by Swiss oncology physicians in the field of astrocytomas and gliomas at the Swiss Cancer Center. Some very scientifically gifted experts in the field were diligently performing innovative trials, and were employing a new and promising approach. However, they were only at the stage where they were experimenting on mice.”

     Peter held Neal’s gaze. “So, you became their first human guinea pig—is that what happened next?”

     Neal nodded. “I became ‘Patient X’ after I signed away my life on about a hundred different forms. It certainly seemed like a stretch to me, but I’m a gambling man even when the odds are not in my favor. The good doctors tried to explain the treatment in one-syllable words, and I have a rough idea of how it all works. Apparently, the researchers have developed a mutated virus that they inject directly into your brain. What happens then is a proliferating infection in the brain cells that turn them into factories that create more virus. That virus then spreads within the tumor. The virus also delivers a certain gene to the cells that serves as a marker. The patient is then given an oral anti-fungal drug specific to that marker, and all the therapies work together to activate the body’s immune system, causing it to recognize and kill only the cancer cells.

     As I said, the treatment was experimental, untested on anything but rodents, and unsanctioned by any medical overseer. However, someone had to be the first idiot to try it—right? It was like I was donating my body for medical research. I really had nothing to lose, and, of course, a back up plan if things didn’t work out. I was always supposed to remain anonymous during the trial, and Mozzie had his instructions to carry out my last wishes and scatter my ashes somewhere peaceful if I died. Some days, I suspected that the treatment was going to kill me before the tumor. Let’s just say that it wasn’t a walk in the park.”

     “But it’s now been almost a year and a half, Neal. So, the treatment seems to have cured you,” Peter said hopefully.

     Neal amended Peter’s assumption. “ _Cured_ is not a word that is in the vernacular of those doctors, Peter. If a patient manages to reach that golden benchmark of five years being cancer-free, then they become a cancer _survivor_. I am grateful for the extra time, and am content just to ‘be’ for whatever time might be in someone’s grand plan. Life is fickle, and I could be run over tomorrow by a driver in the throes of road rage. I have decided not to worry anymore about what I don’t know or what I can’t change.”

     Peter found that he craved more details. “So, is there medicine that you have to take, Neal, or anything special that you have to do?”

     “Not really,” Neal answered. “I check in with my doctors every few months, so that they can do their voodoo and perform their tests. To date, they have been sending me home with a thumbs up. In reality, I live a pretty peaceful and boring life in Lucerne. I read, I paint, I jog, and I actually do row across a lake a time or two when the spirit moves me.”

     “Is Mozzie still with you,” Peter wanted to know.

     “Nah, Mozzie gets restless and finds it hard to stay in one place for too long. Of course, he is always just a phone call away and will come running if I need him.”

     “I was just a phone call away, too, Neal, and I would have come running,” Peter said softly.

     Neal looked at his former-lover fondly. “I know that you would have, Peter, but it just didn’t seem like a good idea at the time. And, as the weeks turned into months, I could only hope that you had gotten over your anger and moved on.”

     “Have you moved on, Neal? When you started feeling better and had a glimmer of hope for a future, did you allow someone else into your life?”

     Neal’s crystalline blue eyes stared into Peter’s brown ones. “I always loved you, Peter, and I still do. So, no—there isn’t a special someone in my life because there isn’t any room for anyone else.”

~~~~~

     Peter visited Neal just once during his incarceration back at Sing Sing. In deference to Agent Burke’s federal position, that visit was a face-to-face meeting, and was not recorded. Three days after that one and only interaction, Neal once again walked out the front gate of the penitentiary. This time, he was dressed in a pinstriped suit with an expensive attaché case under his arm. The guard obligingly opened the door himself so that the apparently high-priced attorney could exit the prison.

     This time, Peter would not be called on to track down the escapee who had vanished without a trace. Perhaps that is because the FBI agent had disappeared as well. Unfortunately, Peter never got to see Lake Como on the Swiss/Italian border. However, Lake Geneva, nestled in the northern Alps between Switzerland and France, was quite impressive to behold. There were even small piers along its banks housing boats that were perfect for rowing. Peter was now in better physical shape than he had ever been!


End file.
